large filesystem backup via autoloader

Hello,

I have a SuSE 9.2 system with four large filesystems (two 1.4 Tb and two 2 Tb) that I want to back up to tape. I am considering buying an autoloader (probably a 16-tape Quantum SuperLoader 3 DLT-S4 with 800 Gb native capacity per tape) for this task. I want to make full backups of all four filesystems.

I have been told that I can use dump and restore's -F option to run a script that would command the autoloader to change tapes every time dump or restore needs to change a tape in a multi-tape dump. This would be important since none of my filesystems are small enough to fit on a single 800 Gb tape. Has anyone out there done this, and in particular has anyone done it with a Quantum SuperLoader 3?

Are there any other good options out there other than dump-restore? Supposedly the Quantum SuperLoader 3 comes with some version of Veritas Backup Exec, but it's not clear if this even runs on Linux. I have also heard about software from CommVault and Bakbone, but I have not been able to find out much about these packages in terms of how they might work with autoloaders.

Thanks!

Roger Davis Univ. of Hawaii